Over the next 12 months, executive agencies plan to issue 209 final deregulatory actions, versus 47 regulatory actions. That works out to 4.4 deregulatory actions for every regulatory action, a marginal improvement on the ratio of 4-to-1 from the fall 2017 agenda. Both remain well ahead of the 2-to-1 target established in Executive Order 13,771.

REGULATORY ACTIVITY TRENDS

As expected, the number of major rules currently in an active stage of rulemaking is increasing as the Trump Administration settles into its second full year in office. The number of major actions listed in the new agenda (88), however, is fewer than the number of major actions at any point in the Obama Administration. What is also important to remember is that a significant number of these actions are deregulatory, whereas such rules were few and far between under President Obama. Of the 88 major actions listed, 47 are designated as either regulatory or deregulatory under EO 13,771. Fifty-seven percent of these designated rules are deregulatory.

The chart below shows the number of major active actions published in the Unified Agenda since the spring 2009 edition. Those actions published during the Obama Administration are in blue, while those under the Trump Administration are in red.

DEREGULATORY PROGRESS

The Trump Administration’s goal for FY2018 is to achieve $687 million in net annual savings from regulations covered by EO 13,771.

According to the American Action Forum’s own analysis, which has tracked final actions identified in their Federal Register notices as an EO 13,771 action and has included quantified costs or savings, the administration has issued 35 deregulatory actions with quantified cost savings against five regulatory measures that impose costs through May 4, 2018. These rules combine for net annual savings of roughly $1.2 billion. This progress is tracked weekly in our Week in Regulation reviews.